📖 Ezra 9
Yesterday we realized we're apart of the building project too. SO Today we'regoing to inspect the building materials. And Ezra 9 is a bit uncomfortable.
The Temple has been rebuilt, Worship is happening again and the people are back where God brought them. They made it out of Babylon. And then Ezra finds out they've started allowing some of the same things back into their lives that caused so much destruction before.
It's easy to stand back and judge them ourselves but How many times have we done that too? God brings us out of something. We pray through it. Cry through it. Fight through it. Learn all the lessons. Tell everybody how faithful God was. Then somewhere down the road we start picking little pieces of it back up again.
Not the whole thing, of course but just enough to make us feel comfortable. An old thought pattern. An attitude. A hurt we decided we wanted to be mad about again. An old habit. A little piece of the person God already told us we didn't have to be anymore.
But just like we learned after leaving Egypt, you can leave Babylon and still carry some Babylon around in your bags.
And I dont know about you but i don't really want to do that anymore. I don't want to spend all this time asking God to rebuild my life, my faith, my ministry, my heart or whatever He's working on and then start decorating the new thing with stuff He already brought me out of.
We also have to look at Ezra's response. He didn't stand up and start pointing at everybody or blaming everyone. He got on his knees and He said we. He included himself in it, he didn't try to pass the blame.
We can become really good at seeing what everybody else needs to work on. We can spot somebody else's problem from across the room. But not our own.
We have to stop and look at ourselves. What have we allowed back in? What did He already free us from that we've gotten comfortable carrying again? What old version of ourselves keep trying to move into what God is building now?
Yesterday we said the builder is part of the building project.
Well.. Sometimes renovation includes demolition. Some things have to come out. Some things don't get repurposed. Some things don't get a cute makeover. Some things just have to go.
That's part of rebuilding too.
Not just asking God, What are we building next,
But also being willing to ask, What can't come with us.
I don't want God to bring me all the way out of Babylon just for me to unpack Babylon when I get home. We habe to get serious about asking God, if there's something in us that he already brought us out of so that we don't carry it into what He's building next.
Rebuilding isn't just picking up the hammer.
Sometimes it's finally putting something down that he's asked us not to carry anymore.
Return. Rebuild. Restore.
Love Pastor Mandy
MandiesDandies / Ark of Hope
Daily reading Ezra 9
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